Why is Hamlet, after more than 400 years, still seen as the ultimate test for an actor? Partly because it's a role of unmatched complexity. Hamlet is intellectually inquisitive, emotionally volatile, physically magnetic. The part places extraordinary demands on an actor who has be introspective and athletic, bestial and angelic, cruel and compassionate.

The role also carries with it an unfair burden of expectation. Any Hamlet who steps on stage knows that he (sometimes "she" since the part transcends gender) is wrestling not just with the text but the weight of tradition. Some will always be seeing Hamlet for the first time. But others will bring with them recent recollections of Tennant, Law, Branagh, Russell Beale or, if they are of an older generation, Redgrave, Olivier (pictured) or Gielgud. Precisely because there is an element of Hamlet in all of us, not least when he meditates on suicide, we seem to claim particular actors as our personal champion.

Yet if Hamlet is the most demanding of roles, it is also the most forgiving. Oscar Wilde wrote that "In point of fact, there is no such thing as Shakespeare's Hamlet: there are as many Hamlets as there are melancholies." Meaning the part, more than any other, depends on the actor's individuality. Which is why it is pointless to see the performances of Simm and Kinnear as a theatrical contest. In playing Hamlet, what each will do is reveal his essential self.